Dick Cheney's amazing chutzpah on Iraq

By Paul Waldman

Updated 1853 GMT (0153 HKT) July 16, 2014

The ISIS terror threat48 photos

Turkish mourners grieve over a coffin during a funeral ceremony in Gaziantep on Tuesday, July 21, for the victims of a suspected ISIS suicide bomb attack. That bombing killed at least 31 people Monday, July 20, in Suruc, a Turkish town that borders Syria. Turkish authorities have blamed the terror group for the attack.

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Protesters turn out with anti-ISIS banners and flags to show support for victims of the Suruc suicide blast during a demonstration July 20 in Istanbul.

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People in Ashmoun, Egypt, carry the coffin for 1st Lt. Mohammed Ashraf, who was killed when the ISIS militant group attacked Egyptian military checkpoints on Wednesday, July 1. At least 17 soldiers were reportedly killed, and 30 were injured.

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Syrians wait near the Turkish border during clashes between ISIS and Kurdish armed groups in Kobani, Syria, on Thursday, June 25. The photo was taken in Sanliurfa, Turkey. ISIS militants disguised as Kurdish security forces infiltrated Kobani on Thursday and killed "many civilians," said a spokesman for the Kurds in Kobani.

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Residents examine a damaged mosque after an Iraqi Air Force bombing in the ISIS-seized city of Falluja, Iraq, on Sunday, May 31. At least six were killed and nine others wounded during the bombing.

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People search through debris after an explosion at a Shiite mosque in Qatif, Saudi Arabia, on Friday, May 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack, according to tweets from ISIS supporters, which included a formal statement from ISIS detailing the operation.

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Iraqi soldiers fire their weapons toward ISIS group positions in the Garma district, west of the Iraqi capital of Baghdad, on Sunday, April 26. Pro-government forces said they had recently made advances on areas held by Islamist jihadists.

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A member of Afghanistan's security forces stands at the site where a suicide bomber on a motorbike blew himself up in front of the Kabul Bank in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, on April 18. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack. The explosion killed at least 33 people and injured more than 100 others, a public health spokesman said.

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Iraqi counterterrorism forces patrol in Ramadi on April 18. Iraqi special forces maintained control of the provincial capital after days of intense clashes with ISIS left the city at risk.

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Thousands of Iraqis cross a bridge over the Euphrates River to Baghdad as they flee Ramadi on Friday, April 17.

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Yazidis embrace after being released by ISIS south of Kirkuk, Iraq, on Wednesday, April 8. ISIS released more than 200 Yazidis, a minority group whose members were killed, captured and displaced when the Islamist terror organization overtook their towns in northern Iraq last summer, officials said.

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Kurdish Peshmerga forces help Yazidis as they arrive at a medical center in Altun Kupri, Iraq, on April 8.

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A Yazidi woman mourns for the death of her husband and children by ISIS after being released south of Kirkuk on April 8.

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People in Tikrit inspect what used to be a palace of former President Saddam Hussein on April 3.

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On April 1, Shiite militiamen celebrate the retaking of Tikrit, which had been under ISIS control since June. The push into Tikrit came days after U.S.-led airstrikes targeted ISIS bases around the city.

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Iraqi security forces launch a rocket against ISIS positions in Tikrit on Monday, March 30.

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The parents of 19-year-old Mohammed Musallam react at the family's home in the East Jerusalem Jewish settlement of Neve Yaakov on Tuesday, March 10. ISIS released a video purportedly showing a young boy executing Musallam, an Israeli citizen of Palestinian descent who ISIS claimed infiltrated the group in Syria to spy for the Jewish state. Musallam's family told CNN that he had no ties with the Mossad, Israel's spy agency, and had, in fact, been recruited by ISIS.

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Iraqi Shiite fighters cover their ears as a rocket is launched during a clash with ISIS militants in the town of Al-Alam, Iraq, on Monday, March 9.

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Displaced Assyrian women who fled their homes due to ISIS attacks pray at a church on the outskirts of Damascus, Syria, on Sunday, March 1. ISIS militants recently abducted at least 220 Assyrians in Syria.

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Safi al-Kasasbeh, right, receives condolences from tribal leaders at his home village near Karak, Jordan, on Wednesday, February 4. Al-Kasasbeh's son, Jordanian pilot Moath al-Kasasbeh, was burned alive in a video that was recently released by ISIS militants. Jordan is one of a handful of Middle Eastern nations taking part in the U.S.-led military coalition against ISIS.

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A Kurdish marksman looks over a destroyed area of Kobani on Friday, January 30, after the city had been liberated from the ISIS militant group. The Syrian city, also known as Ayn al-Arab, had been under assault by ISIS since mid-September.

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Kurdish people celebrate in Suruc, Turkey, near the Turkish-Syrian border, after ISIS militants were expelled from Kobani on Tuesday, January 27.

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Collapsed buildings are seen in Kobani on January 27 after Kurdish forces took control of the town from ISIS.

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Junko Ishido, mother of Japanese journalist Kenji Goto, reacts during a news conference in Tokyo on Friday, January 23. ISIS would later kill Goto and another Japanese hostage, Haruna Yukawa.

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ISIS militants are seen through a rifle's scope during clashes with Peshmerga fighters in Mosul, Iraq, on Wednesday, January 21.

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An elderly Yazidi man arrives in Kirkuk after being released by ISIS on Saturday, January 17. The militant group released about 200 Yazidis who were held captive for five months in Iraq. Almost all of the freed prisoners were in poor health and bore signs of abuse and neglect, Kurdish officials said.

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Smoke billows behind an ISIS sign during an Iraqi military operation to regain control of the town of Sadiyah, about 95 kilometers (60 miles) north of Baghdad, on Tuesday, November 25.

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Fighters from the Free Syrian Army and the Kurdish People's Protection Units join forces to fight ISIS in Kobani on Wednesday, November 19.

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A picture taken from Turkey shows smoke rising after ISIS militants fired mortar shells toward an area controlled by Syrian Kurdish fighters near Kobani on Monday, November 3.

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Iraqi special forces search a house in Jurf al-Sakhar, Iraq, on Thursday, October 30, after retaking the area from ISIS.

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ISIS militants stand near the site of an airstrike near the Turkey-Syria border on Thursday, October 23. The United States and several Arab nations have been bombing ISIS targets in Syria to take out the militant group's ability to command, train and resupply its fighters.

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Kurdish fighters walk to positions as they combat ISIS forces in Kobani on Sunday, October 19.

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Heavy smoke rises in Kobani following an airstrike by the U.S.-led coalition on October 18.

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Cundi Minaz, a female Kurdish fighter, is buried in a cemetery in the southeastern Turkish town of Suruc on Tuesday, October 14. Minaz was reportedly killed during clashes with ISIS militants in nearby Kobani.

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Kiymet Ergun, a Syrian Kurd, celebrates in Mursitpinar, Turkey, after an airstrike by the U.S.-led coalition in Kobani on Monday, October 13.

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Alleged ISIS militants stand next to an ISIS flag atop a hill in Kobani on Monday, October 6.

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A Kurdish Peshmerga soldier who was wounded in a battle with ISIS is wheeled to the Zakho Emergency Hospital in Duhuk, Iraq, on Tuesday, September 30.

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Syrian Kurds wait near a border crossing in Suruc as they wait to return to their homes in Kobani on Sunday, September 28.

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A elderly man is carried after crossing the Syria-Turkey border near Suruc on Saturday, September 20.

Kurdish Peshmerga fighters fire at ISIS militant positions from their position on the top of Mount Zardak, east of Mosul, Iraq, on Tuesday, September 9.

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Displaced Iraqis receive clothes from a charity at a refugee camp near Feeshkhabour, Iraq, on Tuesday, August 19.

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Aziza Hamid, a 15-year-old Iraqi girl, cries for her father while she and some other Yazidi people are flown to safety Monday, August 11, after a dramatic rescue operation at Iraq's Mount Sinjar. A CNN crew was on the flight, which took diapers, milk, water and food to the site where as many as 70,000 people were trapped by ISIS. But only a few of them were able to fly back on the helicopter with the Iraqi Air Force and Kurdish Peshmerga fighters.

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Thousands of Yazidis are escorted to safety by Kurdish Peshmerga forces and a People's Protection Unit in Mosul on Saturday, August 9.

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Thousands of Yazidi and Christian people flee Mosul on Wednesday, August 6, after the latest wave of ISIS advances.

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A Baiji oil refinery burns after an alleged ISIS attack in northern Selahaddin, Iraq, on Thursday, July 31.

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A Syrian rebel fighter lies on a stretcher at a makeshift hospital in Douma, Syria, on Wednesday, July 9. He was reportedly injured while fighting ISIS militants.

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Children stand next to a burnt vehicle during clashes between Iraqi security forces and ISIS militants in Mosul on Tuesday, June 10.

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Story highlights

Paul Waldman: Dick Cheney has some nerve slamming Obama on Iraq -- did he mean Bush?

Waldman: Cheney fails to mention the loss of life, trillions spent in Iraq on his watch

Waldman: Where are his recommendations to solve Iraq? He blames Obama for his mess

You have to hand it to Dick Cheney. How many people, knowing what has happened in Iraq over the last 12 years, would dare to write an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal recently containing this line: "Rarely has a U.S. president been so wrong about so much at the expense of so many" -- and not be talking about George W. Bush? The man has chutzpah.

The op-ed in question was co-written with Cheney's daughter Liz, former State Department worker and failed Senate candidate. The two are forming a new organization, the Alliance for a Strong America.

Of all the former Bush administration officials who have emerged in the last few days to blame the deteriorating situation in Iraq on Barack Obama, one might think Cheney would be among the last.

Paul Waldman

It's one thing to turn on your TV and hear that Obama is a dangerous weakling from people like Paul Wolfowitz and William Kristol, the ones who told us that war with Iraq would be cheap and easy, then bring a wave of peace and democracy across the Middle East.

But Cheney?

Cheney was the war's chief propagandist, who told the American public more spectacular falsehoods than anyone, including Bush himself. Cheney was the one who told us in 2002 that "Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us."

He's the one who tried to convince us that Saddam Hussein might have helped engineer the September 11 attacks, and who said in 2005 that the insurgency in Iraq was "in its last throes." (The war went on for 6½ more years.)

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Cheney's opinion appears to be that all that death and expense never really happened (he doesn't mention them), and that everything bad in Iraq can only be Obama's fault -- because the Bush administration did such a bang-up job there. "Mr. Obama had only to negotiate an agreement to leave behind some residual American forces, training and intelligence capabilities to help secure the peace," he writes. "Instead, he abandoned Iraq and we are watching American defeat snatched from the jaws of victory."

Would "some residual American forces" have been able to keep a lid on the unending Iraqi civil war that Bush and Cheney so effectively unleashed? We'll never really know, but here's what we do know: The agreement mandating that all American troops leave Iraq by the end of 2011 was signed by one George W. Bush, before Obama took office.

As negotiations over our departure proceeded in Obama's first term, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki -- eager to have the Americans gone so he could consolidate what would turn out to be a corrupt sectarian rule -- refused to grant American troops immunity from prosecution in Iraqi courts. Without that immunity, there was simply no way American forces could remain there. We've heard many people say Obama "should have pushed harder," but nobody says exactly what that's supposed to mean, or why al-Maliki would have given in, especially considering how he's acted since.

And what does Cheney think we should do now? He doesn't seem to have any idea. The op-ed contains precisely zero recommendations about Iraq. Defeating al Qaeda, it says, "will require a strategy -- not a fantasy." But what is that strategy? "Sustained difficult military, intelligence and diplomatic efforts"? Oh, of course -- if only we had known!

At least he's not alone in his arrogance and befuddlement. None of Obama's other critics seem to have much of an idea what we should do in Iraq, or Syria, or anywhere else. They're happy to say that whatever Obama is doing isn't enough, and it isn't strong. But if you ask them to be specific about what different decisions they would make, you'll be met with hemming and hawing.

That's because there are only bad options for America in Iraq, as is often the case in the Middle East. If you delude yourself into thinking that wars are simple and easy, and all that matters is whether you're "strong," then sometimes things become quite clear. We'll just invade, we'll be "greeted as liberators" (that was Cheney, too), and everyone will live happily ever after.

And when what actually results is not that glorious and easy victory, but a tidal wave of violence and despair, then all you need to do is wait until after you leave office, when you can blame it all on someone else.